


Silence of the Fallen

by o0SongAndSilence0o



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: It All Started So Innocently, M/M, Renegade Commander Shepard, Renegade Shepard doesn't give a damn, Shepard/Thane vaguely referenced, this just kinda happened
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-14
Updated: 2016-12-14
Packaged: 2018-09-08 13:09:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,131
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8846326
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/o0SongAndSilence0o/pseuds/o0SongAndSilence0o
Summary: When Cortez's shuttle goes down in London, only one person held out long enough on the comm channel...





	

**Author's Note:**

> -cough- Sorry, forgot something.  
> SPOILER ALERT! IF YOU HAVEN'T PLAYED UP TO AT LEAST HALFWAY THROUGH THE FINAL BATTLE OF ME3, YOU'VE BEEN WARNED. 
> 
> (Also gonna do a test. 15 hits in the last, er, several hours. Ok. Gonna experiment and see if moving this from General Audiences to Explicit changes traffic. FOR SCIENCE!) 
> 
> So, this started with me thinking. (Anyone who knows me also knows that can be scary (Such as me wondering how funny it could be to beat someone up with a touch-activated lamp. On, off, on, off-) ANYWAY, this think happened to be a "What if the squad members, at the base Anderson is waiting for you at, were sitting together and jokingly talking about what they'd love to have right about then." type of deal. Then bantering between these lovely men joined the thinks, and...this is the result. I cranked this out in an hour, give or take, out of nowhere.

It happened so fast.

Then again, didn't it all? Reapers hitting earth, having to gun down Lieutenant Commander Williams, And now this.

I guess sometimes it takes the right thing to make the pieces finally connect, you know?

He, Cortez... He'd always been so separate from all of this, I guess. With him being in the shuttle, it just never hit me that we... That I could lose him too, just as easily as the rest of us on the ground.

So when I saw that damned Kodiak spinning out of control over the tops of the buildings... When that comm call went unanswered.

Shepard even having the nerve to call out his name, as if she even knew him. Could count on one hand how often she'd stop by our deck.  
And it wasn't Shepard who was there when he fell apart over Robert. She wasn't the one who sat up late over bottles of tequila and heard stories about where he grew up; his passion for piloting...She never knew him.

What right did she have to care now?

The silence. The silence on the other end stuck. Between each shot and every deafening roar those things made, all I could really hear was that silence.

When we made it to Anderson was the worst. Just sitting there until everyone in charge said otherwise. And damn it but I kept that comm channel open. As if it would change anything.

After an hour or so, I couldn't take it anymore. There were some firetrucks in a garage down the street. Partway through removing a busted brake line, I heard it. A soft crackle.. Or was it a groan?

Kicking myself in the teeth, I went back to the truck. My hands barely touched the thing and I heard it again, but louder.

I don't remember crossing the room to the comm unit. I hesitated before saying anything and when I did, it was barely a whisper. Pull it together, Chico.

"Esteban?" I repeated, forcing my voice to be a little louder. I wanted it to be real, but there was no way. It had been hours...

A pained gasp rattled through the earpiece. "Vega? Heh...of course you'd be listening."

There was a thick feeling in my throat that, for a moment, all that could pass through it was a laugh. The tension from that silence. It lifted.

"Someone had to keep watch in case your dumb ass made it out of that." The obvious pain in his tone... "Where are you? I'll get Shepard; we can come ge-"

He cut me off, "Don't bother. Only reason I'm still-" a wet cough interrupted his sentence. "Still here is because I'm stuck under the shuttle. I can see them out there."

The image. It made me shut my eyes for a moment, but I immediately wished I hadn't.

"No way. We can get you out of there, just give me a minu-"

"James. Please." he begged, and I could tell just by how he said it that he didn't need to explain. He wouldn't last long enough to find him.

It reminded me of him standing over that recording. He'd started talking about Robert, about what had happened. It wasn't help he'd wanted then, and it wasn't what he wanted now. He needed comfort.

I was never very good at that, and never have been. Guess it was safe to admit the guy was enough of a soft spot for me to bring that out.

My hand was clenched painfully around the edge of a table and it took actual effort to let go. What do you say when something like this happens?

"Seems... Seems your reckless driving has caught up to you." I finally managed, hoping it didn't sound to Cortez as shaky as I could hear it.

"Laugh it up, Vega." he jabbed, the chuckle on the end sending the man into a coughing fit that tore at something in my chest.

I'd seen people... You know. Seen it a lot. But hearing it is a different animal. You're forced to pay attention to each blood-soaked breath, every forced word.

"Did you hear me?" Memories of others lost to this damned war kept playing behind my eyelids, and I'd missed whatever he'd continued with.

"Come again?"

"I said... I said, I'd kill to find out the score for the next game..and a cold cerveza when my team wins again." That rattle again, this time with the grinding sound indicating the shifting of metal. "What about you? Can't look too much better where you're standing."

You here.

But he knew that already. If I was in his shoes, I would know it.

"Ah, an afternoon on South Mission Beach. Some tanned ladies in bikinis.."

That brought another pained laugh. "Typical...Hey, James? I-I'm glad it was you listening. And I wanted to tell you that-"

A louder, more piercing shriek of metal nearly made me tear the earpiece out. The following crashing stopped my hand halfway.

"Steve? Steve?!" I panicked. Not so fast, please no.

"It's okay...Its nothing to- to worry about." From the sound of it, of the flutter his words took, it was anything but.

"Don't you tell me it's nothing to worry about, dammit! I could have done something!" Snapping, the angry outburst made me kick at a bucket, sending it flying across the road.

"After you've already done... So much... " the voice on the other end of the comm breathed, much quieter now.

The fury had fallen as quickly as it had risen up, and then some.

I was cracking and could feel it, but couldn't stop myself.

"You weren't supposed to get hurt. You were supposed to be safe in that elephant of a shuttle up there." I choked, words tumbling from my mouth. "What will I have to go back to when this is over, huh? You're all I have, Esteban."

And just like that, it all hit me at once. Every cracked joke, every drink shared over stories. That was all gone. And the hollow, sick feeling that left in my stomach...No, if I could have anything now it would be to wake up back in the shuttle bay just one more time. Just so I could...

Could what?

I didn't get a response that time. Somewhere between one word and the next, the silence came back.

I'd like to think that, at the end, I could almost feel him smile at least. Hand dropping to my side, my eyes found Shepard, up on the balcony of one of the buildings.

It seems we both knew now that war, especially this one, was a bad time to find out you're in love.

I wonder if he knew that too.


End file.
